Taiping was once a thriving mining town and used to be the capital of Perak. Its disused mining pools have been cleverly turned into the beautiful and famous Taiping Lake Gardens.

Other attractions include the hill resort Bukit Larut (Maxwell Hill); Taiping Zoo, which was the first zoo in Malaysia; and the Bukit Jana Golf and Country Club. If you’d like to savour a little bit of Taiping’s history, then the British Resident’s Residence is the place to visit.

Taiping receives the most rainfall making it the wettest town in Peninsular Malaysia. The average annual rainfall is about 4,000mm in Taiping while the peninsula’s average is 2,000mm – 2,500mm.

THE national railway company, Keretapi Tanah Melayu Bhd (KTMB), plans to call a tender for contracts worth a combined RM1.1 billion this year, its chief said.

The projects will help upgrade and expand its rail network, KTMB managing director Datuk Mohd Salleh Abdullah told Business Times in an interview.

Under the five-year Ninth Malaysia Plan, the Government has allocated RM4.1 billion for railway infrastructure. Out of this, RM2.9 billion will be spent on ongoing construction activities while RM1.1 billion will go towards new projects.

The Government has given its approval in principle for KTMB to implement a double-tracking project from Taiping to Padang Rengas, Perak.

This will cost as much as RM800 million.

The project will involve building new rail tracks over a 20km stretch, inclusive of 3km tunnelling work.

“The tunnelling work is at Bukit Berapit. It will involve the building of two tunnels of approximately 1.5km each. We will be preparing the tender documents soon and will call for a tender over the next few months,” Mohd Salleh said.

KTMB will also call for a tender to extend the commuter lines from Seremban to Sg Gadut, Negri Sembilan.

This will be an extension to the Klang Valley Commuter system.

The contract, worth some RM300 million, will involve the construction of 8.5km double tracks, flyovers and br idges.

“We are in the midst of preparing the tender documents and we hope to call for a tender in the next four months,” said Mohd Salleh.

KTMB may invite the Gamuda Bhd-MMC Engineering partnership, UEM Builders Bhd and Road Builder Holdings Bhd to present their bids due to their expertise, an industry source said.

“Gamuda-MMC seems like the likely players to do the tunnelling work because of their expertise in handling the SMART project, while UEM is currently in the midst of completing the Rawang to Ipoh double- tracking job,” the source said.

The SMART project is a flood mitigation project in Kuala Lumpur in which an underground highway tunnel that doubles as a huge drain is being built.

Several other projects which received approval are the Sentul- Batu Caves double-tracking high-speed rail project; the procurement of rolling stocks; and the rehabilitation and upgrade of railway infrastructure involving tracks and bridges.

KTMB’s current projects include the Rawang-Ipoh electrified double- tracking project, rail infrastructure development at Batu Gajah, and the rehabilitation of Sabah’s railways.

yaayy ....my Home town .. gosh! i miss this place sooo much ...probably the only town that nothing ever changes ... the market, trees, parks and that huge stone slides I remember 15 years ago ...is just the way it is today ..even the rusty ol' Kamunting sign boards hahaha ... so much nostalgia ..so lil time ...gosh am proud to have been born and brought up in Taiping ... [IMG]Taiping_gdns_1.jpg[/IMG]

TAIPING: The Tekah airport, one of the country’s oldest having been built by the British in 1940, has been chosen as the hub for Global Flying Hospitals (GFH), an international body that brings humanitarian medical support to developing countries.

Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Mohd Tajol Rosli Ghazali said the flying hospital's local representatives had picked Tekah over a few shortlisted sites recently and a memorandum of understanding (MoU) is expected to be signed within a few months.

He said GFH plans to use the Tekah airport as its landing hub to cater for its A310A Airbus aircrafts, to fly in its patients and supplies.

Tajol Rosli said Mercy Malaysia had recently signed a MoU with GFH, enabling the former to operate flying hospitals during emergency crises around the region.

(At the signing ceremony, GFH founder and chairman Neil Newton had said that the body intends to form a fleet of 10 large aircraft and supplementary helicopters and smaller planes to help Mercy create a broader footprint to meet the needs of the people in various regions in emergencies and disasters.)

Tajol Rosli said that the Tekah airport refurbishment was part of a RM3bil investment by the private sector, subject to Federal government approval.

“The expansion of the Tekah airport’s runway will entail the acquisition of 450ha of land and some (terrace) houses located around its fringes,” he said, adding that no terminal would be built other than a few small offices to house the Immigration and Customs Departments.

TAIPING: A private company is keen to operate a cable car system to ferry visitors up to Bukit Larut which is now only accessible by jeep.

State Public Utility and Infrastructures Committee chairman Datuk Ho Cheng Wang said while the state government welcomed the idea, it was also concerned over the stance of residents here who had protested a similar proposal in the past.

“The company now operates a cable car system in Langkawi. It feels that a cable car system here is viable, based on the number of visitors here, especially the Taiping Zoo which records about 700,000 visitors annually,” Ho told a press conference yesterday.

“In Langkawi, the cable car system is used by only about 100,000 visitors annually.”

Ho, who is a member of a panel set up by Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Mohd Tajol Rosli to vet the proposal, said they would get public feedback first.

“We don’t want the residents here to pro- test against the project once the company is given the green light by the state government,” he added.

In the early 1990s, a teachers’ cooperative had suggested a cable car service in exchange for prime land at the Lake Garden here to build hotels. The proposal met with protests from environmentalists who said the project would affect the water catchment area around the foothill of Bukit Larut.

Ho said representatives of the company had been informed that it would not be given land located within the Lake Garden, except for a small plot to enable it to set up its ticketing booths, a small cafe or a souvenir shop.

“No rampant felling of trees on the hill will be permitted as we don’t want to spoil the environment,” added Ho.

Ho, who is also Pokok Assam state assemblyman, said visitors to the hill had complained that the existing jeep service could not meet the demand especially during the school holidays or long weekends.

"the said Municipality of George Town shall on the First Day of January in the Year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred and fifty seven and forever thereafter be a city and shall be called and styled the CITY OF GEORGE TOWN instead of the Municipality of George Town and shall thenceforth have all such rank, liberties, privileges and immunities as are incident to a city." - Queen Elizabeth II